


fade to gold

by pinkwinwin



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Abstract, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Friends to Lovers, Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst, M/M, Moving In Together, Sort of? - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-20
Updated: 2019-09-20
Packaged: 2020-10-24 15:23:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,354
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20708231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pinkwinwin/pseuds/pinkwinwin
Summary: “This is just temporary,” Mingyu replies.They both know this isn’t true.





	fade to gold

**Author's Note:**

  * For [agonies (Hyb)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hyb/gifts).

> [mood music](https://youtu.be/hiJu5K9Oe28)
> 
> I wish I had an explanation for this
> 
> #

Mingyu comes crashing into his life at 7p.m. on a Tuesday in November. 

Shell-shocked and a little brokenhearted, he shows up on Jihoon’s doorstep with a box of his things and a bag slung on one arm. His hair is soaked at the tips from rain and there’s an apology already forming on his lips when Jihoon opens the door a little wider.

“Come in,” Jihoon says.

“This is just temporary,” Mingyu replies.

They both know this isn’t true.

  
  


The fault was no one’s, it’s just the product of what happens when your best friend falls in love. Soon a shared space becomes a little too shared, where there was room for two it becomes three— and then two again.

Or, at least that’s what Mingyu says. 

“I’m sure it wasn’t intentional,” Jihoon responds after hearing the story. “Minghao would never kick you out.”

  
  
Mingyu rubs his chin with his wrist, a habit he’s had for years. “I know,” he says quietly. “It was my idea.”

Jihoon wonders if there was yelling, if things were thrown— he can’t imagine how Minghao would be in a fight. He was always the calm one in their friend group. Always a whisper amidst the chaos.

He supposes it doesn’t matter much now.

Now there’s just a man sitting in his living room, shoulders sagged from the burden of a wounded friendship. Of wounded pride. 

“It’s not your job, you know,” Mingyu says, staring down at his sneakered feet as they shuffle against the wood floor.

Jihoon wonders.

He supposes it isn’t all that bad. 

There’s someone here to fill the space now. When Jihoon is too tied up with work, crouched over his laptop as he types away, there’s noise filling the apartment. Shuffling feet and a spoon clinking against the edge of the mug as Mingyu stirs his coffee. 

Small changes, Jihoon tells himself. Small changes are okay.

  
  


Every so often Mingyu will look up at him after Jihoon finally crawls out of his makeshift office, finally cracks his bones and rolls his shoulders back.

He looks at him and it’s warm. First it’s without implication, just a friend looking at him kindly. And then it shifts, morphs to something with violet undertones and a silver lining of  _ something  _ just beneath Mingyu’s bones. 

Jihoon reminds himself this is just temporary. It’s getting harder to believe.

“What are you working on?”

  
  
Mingyu asks him one morning, mouth full of Cheerios and feet tucked under him on the couch. Jihoon has to blink for a moment, eyes wide behind round frames.

“Sorry?”

  
  
Mingyu shifts, leaning his elbow on the armrest and giving Jihoon a pointed look. “I hear you tinkering away in your office on some music,” he says. “Not exactly something you can hide in this apartment.”

Jihoon swallows down his coffee, makes a calculated effort to ensure the hand gripping the mug isn’t shaking. He thinks about how his fingers hit the keys softly, how his voice was barely a whisper over the notes of the piano. He bites back memories of Mingyu’s smile and how his hair looks first thing in the morning.

Six months of sharing an apartment changes things. Or perhaps brings things to the surface that were always there.

“Just an old project, nothing worth sharing.”

  
  
The look Mingyu gives him is one Jihoon is very familiar with, one he wishes he could wipe away.

They haven’t seen Minghao and Junhui much since then. Not for lack of caring, but Jihoon feels it’s difficult for Mingyu to put his heart back together again when he sees them. Knowing the person you called your soulmate move on with someone else is like finding an old letter in the back of a shoebox. Too many memories on paper without any of them playing out in life.

Or, at least that’s what Jihoon thinks. 

Mingyu sinks down into the oversized chair by the door, toeing out of his boots and sighing. His body melts into the worn leather, chocolate brown complimenting the tan against Mingyu’s arms as he drapes them across the armrest. 

Jihoon looks at him, strips out of his own shoes and jacket. A question is on the tip of his tongue but he swallows it down. 

“Dinner was good,” he says instead. “It was nice to see them again.”

  
  
“Yeah,” Mingyu says, looking out the far window. His head is turned away from Jihoon, but he can see the muscles strained in his neck. When he looks back at him, Jihoon is reminded of how  _ open _ Mingyu is. He lays himself bare, loves so hard he gives away the tendons and arteries that make up his chest cavity.

Until there’s nothing left. 

“It’s not your job, you know.” Mingyu whispers. His chest splayed open. “To put me back together again.”

  
And it clicks, something in Jihoon’s head. His mind is an old movie projected on the wall but the film reel is all tangled up. Maybe if Jihoon can gather up the reel himself, tacky against his fingers, Mingyu won’t see. 

One look at Mingyu and Jihoon knows just how wrong he is.

Jihoon picked this bedroom because he liked how rain sounded against the window. He stayed here for three weeks with almost no furniture, sleeping in every room in the apartment before ultimately deciding on the placement of his bed. Now it lay tucked beneath a large window, one that faces a quiet part of the street

But his favorite part is the rain, how it greets him on the rainy November night with a whisper against glass. 

Tonight he doesn't hear just rain. He hears shuffling and covers being pushed back in another room, and he knows well enough to not feign sleep. He just tilts his head up, looks at the water droplets running down the glass from where he pulls the blinds up just enough.

Mingyu isn’t graceful, but he still manages to slip into Jihoon’s bed quietly. His head on Jihoon’s chest, his large arms caging him in on each side. Jihoon can smell the almond and shea of the shampoo that Mingyu had certainly stolen from him months back. 

“Tell me a story,” Mingyu says, his voice quiet. Jihoon is well beyond rolling his eyes, so he merely looks up at the window. He thinks he can see the stars. 

“When I was a child,” Jihoon starts, his right hand gravitating towards Mingyu’s hair and letting his fingers thread through the locks. “My mother told me about starpeople.”

  
  
“Starpeople?” Mingyu slurs, already seeming to fight back sleep. Jihoon doesn’t laugh.

“She said they were our guardians, I guess.” Jihoon says. “Beings who looked after us, wanted the best for us.” 

  
  
“Hmm,” Mingyu hums, tightening his arms up so they’re pressed against Jihoon’s side. He rubs his cheek against Jihoon’s chest slightly, and he knows Mingyu is trying to listen to his heartbeat.

If only he knew by now how to steady it, Jihoon thinks. 

“They love us,” Jihoon says, voice violet in the dark room. “That’s what she always told me, anyway.” He lays there and listens to Mingyu’s breath become slow and even, and Jihoon is certain he’s fallen asleep until he speaks again.

“I guess that makes you my starperson,” Mingyu says, simply. And  _ oh,  _ Jihoon sees the silver lining, sees his mind playing out on the wall— his thoughts are projected like an old movie and they’re all shots of Mingyu’s smile, the dip of his collarbone, the way his nose scrunches up when he laughs. He hears the song overlayed over the shots, the one he’s been working out in his office for months now.

The silver lining shifts, fades to gold.

Jihoon wants to remind Mingyu this is just temporary, but his chin tilts down and his lips kiss the top of Mingyu’s head. His fingers slip through his hair, scratching lightly at Mingyu’s scalp even if just to remind Jihoon himself that they’re both alive.

“Yeah,” Jihoon whispers, so simple. “And now you’re in my bed.”

  
  
“This is just temporary,” Mingyu replies.

They both know this isn’t true.

**Author's Note:**

> Hyb has finally fallen victim to my habit of randomly gifting abstract fics. I figured you might enjoy this style of writing, and jigyu is never a burden, I hope. I blame Eden for having the perfect song for this pair 
> 
> Blessings to [Any](https://twitter.com/johntographique) for beta'ing and supporting my work no matter how abruptly I write it
> 
> Comments and kudos are appreciated, as always. ♡  
[Fic Twitter](https://twitter.com/pinkwinwin)  
[Main Twitter](https://twitter.com/truantseeker)  
[Curious Cat](https://curiouscat.me/pinkwinwin)


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